Be careful how you do one man a pleasure which must needs occasion equal displeasure in another. For he who is thus slighted will not forget, but will think the offence to himself the greater in that another profits by it; while he who receives the pleasure will either not remember it, or will consider the favour done him less than it really was.

Pay no heed to those who tell you that they have relinquished place and power of their own accord, and from their love of quiet. For almost always they have been brought to this retirement by their insufficiency and against their will.

He is less likely to be mistaken who looks forward to a change in the affairs of the world than he who regards them as firm and stable.

Let no one trust so entirely to natural prudence as to persuade himself that it will suffice to guide him without help from experience.

How much luckier than all the rest of mankind are the astrologers who, if they tell one truth among a hundred lies, obtain so much credit that even their lies are believed.

He who imitates what is evil always goes beyond the example that is set; on the contrary, he who imitates what is good always falls short.

To relinquish a present good through apprehension of a future evil is in most instances unwise ... from a fear which may afterwards turn out groundless, you lost the good that lay within your grasp.